English Words without consonants

English has very few words of more than one syllable without a consonant, apart from proper names such as Aeaea, Aiea, Aia, Io, Eiao, Oea, and sometimes Iowa (below), and perhaps a few taxonomic terms such as Iouea below.

• The maned sloth, or ai, is pronounced with two syllables: /ˈɑːi/.
• Aa, a type of lava, is spelled without consonants, but is pronounced with a glottal stop, which is marginal in English: /ˈɑːʔɑː/.
• The aye-aye, a type of lemur: /ˈaɪaɪ/
• Euouae, a musical cadence taken from the vowels in the hymn Gloria Patri doxology: “seculorum Amen”, is the longest English word spelled without any consonant letters; it is also the English word with the most consecutive vowels. However, it is also pronounced with an initial consonant: /juːˈoʊi/. Euoi, an interjection expressing Bacchic frenzy, is similar.
• Iouea, /aɪjuːˈiːə/, or without consonant pronunciation, /aɪoʊˈiːə/.